I’ve always enjoyed stories – reading, writing, and sharing them with others. Using a story is a very powerful way to share information and ideas. As children, we were conditioned to learn from stories. Every fairy tale and fable that our parents and teachers shared with us had some kind of lesson or moral that we took away. As we get older, the stories seem to disappear from our educational experiences,...

The Velveteen Rabbit has always been my favorite story, and I still get teary if I so much as see the cover of the book. As a child, I had severe asthma and allergies, and my doctor told my mother to take all of my stuffed animals away to remove any allergens from my environment that might be causing my asthma to get worse. I could really relate to how the little boy felt when his velveteen rabbit was taken away to...

Several years ago, I worked in a hospital as an educator. A new patient tower was under construction, and during that time, some of the departments and patient care areas were shifted around. The Emergency Department triage desk was moved closer to my office, so I’d pass by it several times a day. I started to notice that if the nurses were having a slow moment, they’d often pick up a nursing journal or...

Lateral violence is at the forefront of every mind in health care right now. Nursing shortages continue to grow, and while many schools and health care organizations are struggling to put new nurses into the pipeline supplying the nursing workforce, there are just as many individuals and organizations that are looking at the ‘drainpipe’ that takes capable and competent nurses out of employment. With the...

I used to be an Emergency Medical Technician and spent a couple of years working in the pre-hospital setting. I had spent months and months poring over my textbooks and working in manikins in preparation for patient care in the back of an ambulance, but nothing could have prepared me for what it would be like in the ‘real world.’ During one of my very first patient care experiences, my preceptor had started...

I wouldn’t say that Lions and Tigers and Nurses is necessarily the best way to learn about lateral violence, but it is certainly a unique and different way to learn. The story is based on concepts and ideas presented in evidence-based research published by contemporary experts. I recommend to all readers of Lions and Tigers and Nurses that they refer to the suggested reading list in the back of the book, and...

Absolutely not! I simply chose nurses as the major target group for this series for several reasons. I have worked with nurses for 15 years, so I have been an outsider looking in on the world of nursing and I have learned a lot about the way that nurses think and feel. Nurses are the largest population of non-physician health care professionals; they have an incredible, rich history as a profession; and they have...